[HN Gopher] 12,000-year-old realistic human statue was unearthed
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12,000-year-old realistic human statue was unearthed
 
Author : khole
Score  : 74 points
Date   : 2023-10-01 18:51 UTC (4 hours ago)
 
web link (arkeonews.net)
w3m dump (arkeonews.net)
 
| dghughes wrote:
| What a crazy week for old things discovered this statue at
| Gobekli Tepe and the 400,000 year-old notched lumber beams in
| Zambia.
| 
| https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-66846772
 
  | silisili wrote:
  | Wow, didn't see that Zambia one, that's big news to me.
  | 
  | Question - how can they prove that someone in more recent times
  | didn't notch more ancient wood?
 
  | jcpst wrote:
  | > Scientists created models to show how overlapping logs could
  | have been used
  | 
  | I _love_ how in other words you could also say "played with
  | lincoln logs" :)
 
| waynecochran wrote:
| Two things: how is is dated? and was that NSFW 12000 years ago?
 
| mkaic wrote:
| If you're interested in learning more about these incredible
| Turkish archaeological sites, I can't recommend the YouTube
| channel Miniminuteman [0] enough. Milo is extremely passionate
| about his field of study and makes highly entertaining and
| informative videos about archaeology and anthropology, including
| a recent series where he became the first real archaeologist ever
| to be allowed to film a documentary on-site at Karahantepe! [1]
| 
| [0] https://www.youtube.com/@miniminuteman773
| 
| [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8EaKFKYPXVk
 
  | [deleted]
 
| seqizz wrote:
| You know there is already a conspiracy about its phallus [0]?
| Which might be broken for unknown reasons.
| 
| [0]: https://arkeofili.com/karahantepede-bulunan-insan-
| heykelinin...
 
| andrewstuart wrote:
| It makes me happy that it's possible that future humans might
| live again on an earth 12,000 years in the future which has
| cooled again after our civilisation has boiled the planet.
 
  | usrusr wrote:
  | Why would it cool in 12k years? We are loading the atmosphere
  | with carbon sequestered over much longer periods. Some of which
  | even happened in a phase of massive imbalance in the
  | evolutionary "war" between plants and plant consumers: trees
  | had found a way to _never rot_ (be consumed) which is rather
  | tragic for incumbent biological systems but a crazy boost for
  | carbon sequestering.
  | 
  | The problem is not that we produce heat, the problem is that we
  | change the balance point between energy influx from the sun and
  | energy emission to space. That changed balance point will
  | remain changed much, much longer than 12k years. If we don't
  | have a technological miracle, humans 12k in the future will
  | live in tiny habitable zones near the poles.
 
  | hist_thw wrote:
  | [dead]
 
| caprock wrote:
| The last couple of pictures, of the eyes and the bird, are really
| neat. Gobeklitepe continues to provide interesting results.
| 
| It's kind of comforting and exciting that we have so much yet to
| uncover about the past.
 
  | detourdog wrote:
  | I take great comfort in trying to figure out why these sites
  | were buried. I believe the current understanding is that that
  | were carefully covered with dirt contemporaneously with usage.
 
| pelorat wrote:
| That's not what I consider a "realistic human statue" ?
 
  | ftxbro wrote:
  | On hacker news everything is 0% or 100%.
 
  | moomoo11 wrote:
  | That's what people looked like back then.
 
    | andrewstuart wrote:
    | Weird that people don't understand evolution.
 
  | kwhitefoot wrote:
  | Me too. Why does the title claim realism when the article it
  | points at doesn't? The article only claims a realistic facial
  | expression.
 
  | Koshkin wrote:
  | It has all the parts...
 
  | dwd wrote:
  | I maybe wasn't expecting Bernini level of realism, but
  | "Augustus of Prima Porta" is around 2000 years old which
  | greatly predates Renaissance tooling.
 
  | jdthedisciple wrote:
  | I beg to differ- how does that not look exactly like us
  | 
  | https://i0.wp.com/themindcircle.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/...
  | 
  | From the better link someone posted below:
  | 
  | https://themindcircle.com/new-gobeklitepe-and-karahantepe-fi...
 
  | [deleted]
 
  | INTPenis wrote:
  | Yeah I was expecting something like a greek statue with very
  | realistic human features, but I guess this is still astounding
  | since other statues of the time are even less anthropomorphous.
 
    | pavlov wrote:
    | We have a fairly good idea of how sculpture evolved in the
    | past 5,000 years or so. By 2500 BCE, the Egyptians had
    | already mastered realistic sculpture:
    | 
    | https://www.mfa.org/gallery/masterpieces-of-egyptian-
    | sculptu...
    | 
    | But this discovery is a whopping 7,500 years older. It would
    | have been inconceivably ancient to the pyramid builders too.
 
  | z500 wrote:
  | More like anatomically correct.
 
  | fsckboy wrote:
  | > _That 's not what I consider a "realistic human statue" ?_
  | 
  | the HN title is wrong, TFA says "realistic facial expression".
  | Of course, it's neither a realistic facial expression, so all
  | the comments are still valid. Carry on.
 
| dinkblam wrote:
| better link with less and less offensive ads:
| 
| https://arkeonews.net/new-discoveries-in-gobeklitepe-and-kar...
 
  | amphitheatre wrote:
  | Thank you. What a garbage website OP linked to...
 
  | dang wrote:
  | OK, we changed to that from https://themindcircle.com/new-
  | gobeklitepe-and-karahantepe-fi.... Thanks!
 
| khole wrote:
| The recent excavations unearthed a painted wild boar statue, a
| human statue, and a vulture statue. All statues are new gateways
| to understanding pre-historic art and culture.
 
  | chiefalchemist wrote:
  | Not being snarky but the big deal is we're pushing back the
  | line (read: year / era) dividing pre-history from history.
  | These discoveries became history now, yes?
 
    | biorach wrote:
    | Nope.
    | 
    | > Prehistory, also called pre-literary history, is the period
    | of human history between the first known use of stone tools
    | by hominins c. 3.3 million years ago and the beginning of
    | recorded history with the invention of writing systems.
    | 
    | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prehistory
    | 
    | The big deal is that these art works are far more
    | sophisticated that anything else we have seen so early.
 
      | AlotOfReading wrote:
      | This is one common definition of the term history, but it's
      | not a very good one and largely relegated to outdated
      | encyclopedia entries rather than describing how
      | professionals investigate history. It's very poor as a
      | technical definition. For instance, does "history" in an
      | area start when someone writes something, or does the
      | writing have to survive to the present day? Does only one
      | person need to write, or does it need to be socially
      | widespread? Does it have to be full writing or does
      | protowriting count? Do we have to be able to read the
      | writing? Do partial readings count? These ambiguities
      | weren't issues back when it was being used as a criterion
      | for "civilization" ala childe, but that time has long since
      | passed.
      | 
      | Today, it's best to ignore all these difficult and largely
      | unnecessary questions by simply using a descriptive
      | definition where "history is the human past".
 
      | late2part wrote:
      | Names don't constitute knowledge.
      | 
      | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lFIYKmos3-s&t=1s
 
| [deleted]
 
| nimbius wrote:
| As an american, I fully expect to find this thing on my ballot
| come 2024.
 
| solardev wrote:
| Seems like graphics have gotten a bit better since then
 
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(page generated 2023-10-01 23:00 UTC)